


Thawing Out

by Persiflage



Series: Mashed Up Tropes Fics [20]
Category: Holby City
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Related, Episode: s19e07 The Kill List, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Mash-up, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Panic Attacks, Sick Character, Trapped In Elevator, Trope de Trope, Tumblr Prompt, different episode ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:55:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28257285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Persiflage/pseuds/Persiflage
Summary: Canon Divergence: There was no kiss inThe Kill Listand Serena's spent the three weeks since Bernie's return from Kyiv ostracising her until events out of her control make her realise what a fool she's being.
Relationships: Serena Campbell/Bernie Wolfe
Series: Mashed Up Tropes Fics [20]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1960414
Comments: 4
Kudos: 58





	Thawing Out

**Author's Note:**

> Written for an Anon for the Mashed Up Tropes Meme on Tumblr, for the tropes: 70. Locked in a Room and 27. Sick/Injured Fic.

Serena Campbell is already feeling on edge at having to share the lift with Berenice bloody Wolfe, to whom she has said very few words and none of them not strictly professional since she slunk back to Holby from Kyiv three weeks ago, and then the lift breaks down. The thought of being trapped in there with the blonde is entirely unappealing so she immediately presses the button to indicate to maintenance that it's broken down.

"Stubbs here," says a familiar voice.

"Serena Campbell. The lift has broken down."

"We're aware, Ms Campbell, and we'll have you out of there as soon as we can."

"Thank you."

Serena heaves a sigh. She's glad that she's wearing her coat as it's been a bitterly cold night and the lift isn't warm; she'd barely arrived on AAU when Sacha had called her for an urgent consultation, so she had gone straight up to see him without removing her coat. Bernie, on the other hand, is only wearing her scrubs and looks far from warm. Serena tries not to care, or to wonder why she isn't wearing her usual long-sleeved thermal top underneath her scrub top. She does just about manage to refrain from asking about this.

"I hope Mr Stubbs remembers to let Fletch know where you are or he'll be wondering why you're not there for the handover of the ward."

Bernie's voice sounds hoarse, Serena notices, and she can't help frowning. "Are you sick?" she asks.

"Do you care?" Serena can't help hearing the edge of bitterness in Bernie's voice.

"I care if it means that the ward will be down a consultant again."

"I've got a minor cold, that's all."

Serena does not say: _It serves you right for running off to Kyiv for two months in the middle of winter_ ; nor _Perhaps if you wore more layers you wouldn't be so susceptible_ ; nor _You need more meat on your bones_. She does notice, however, that Bernie seems to have lost some weight since she went to Kyiv, which she couldn't afford to do given how slender she is on a normal day. Right now she looks as if one puff of wind would knock her down. 

Serena is alarmed to notice the dark smudges under the other woman's eyes, and she reluctantly wonders how much sleep Bernie's getting. She recalls that she's the one who switched Bernie over to nights only a couple of days after her return from Kyiv because she couldn’t bear to see the other woman’s hangdog expression on her ward. 

She wonders, a little guiltily, if she’s being too hard on Bernie, then she decides that she is not the one at fault, here. She is not the one who buggered off to Kyiv at five minutes notice, all because she was scared – as if Serena herself wasn’t scared! It’s positively terrifying to realise that you’ve fallen in love with your best friend, and even more so when said friend is a woman.

The lift intercom crackles into life. “Ms Campbell?”

“Yes Mr Stubbs?”

“I’m afraid it’s going to take us a little longer to get you out of the lift as there’s an intermittent electrical fault that we’re having trouble tracking down.”

Serena pinches the bridge of her nose. “Very well.”

“I’ve got my boys and girls on it, and we’ll have you out of there as soon as we can.”

“Thank you, Mr Stubbs.”

“I’ve notified Mr Fletcher on AAU of your whereabouts. He asked me if you’d seen Ms Wolfe? He said she’d gone up to consult on Darwin and no one’s seen her since.”

“She’s here, Mr Stubbs,” Serena tells him wearily.

“Ah. Good to know. I’ll inform Mr Fletcher.”

“Very well, Mr Stubbs.”

“Cheerio.” There’s a click and Serena knows Stubbs has gone. She heaves a sigh, wishing she’d taken the stairs instead, although that’s not something she does. Unlike Bernie Wolfe, who has a habit of going up and down the stairs like a young mountain goat.

“Why are you in here?” she asks.

Bernie seems to shrink in on herself, wrapping her arms around torso. “The lift’s available for everyone to use,” she mutters.

“Yes, but you usually take the stairs.”

The blonde shakes her head. “I knew you were due in for the handover of the ward. I thought the lift would be quicker. Wish I’d taken the stairs now.”

“You and me, both.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Ms Campbell, to inconvenience you with my presence. Do you imagine I’m enjoying this any more than you? Being trapped in a small box with someone who’s gone out of their way to demonstrate their complete indifference to my existence?”

Bernie turns away, but not before Serena sees the hurt in her eyes. She swallows, about to speak, but Bernie stumbles against the wall, and Serena realises that she’s gasping for breath and there’s a light sheen of sweat on her skin. She frowns.

“Shit. Shit. Shit.” The words rasp from Bernie’s throat, then she tucks herself into the back corner of the lift, sliding down the wall to sit with her knees bent up and her arms wrapped around her legs. Serena can hear her breathing has become ragged and she diagnoses a panic attack.

The realisation that Bernie Wolfe, the great and illustrious Bernie Wolfe, who’s known for her fearlessness under fire, is having a panic attack freezes Serena in place. She wonders, furiously, how long this has been going on, how long her co-lead has been hiding this from her. She doesn’t stop to consider that she’s been ostracising Bernie since her return from Kyiv, and therefore hasn’t encouraged any kind of openness between them.

“Why didn’t you tell me you’re suffering from panic attacks?” she demands.

“Piss off, Campbell,” Bernie says, her face still buried against her bent knees. “Hanssen knows. My therapist knows. No one else needed to.”

“I’m your co-lead!” Serena snaps.

Bernie lifts her head a little and Serena feels her heart clench at the hurt, anger, and misery in the other woman’s eyes. “Could’ve fooled me,” Bernie rasps out. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Hard to co-lead a ward with someone when they’re permanently on nights and you exchange the bare minimum of words with them every day at the handover. I understand that I hurt you – very badly – but your behaviour’s hardly been professional, Ms Campbell.”

“I –”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be out of your hair soon.”

“What does that mean?” Serena feels a surge of panic at Bernie’s words. “Are you leaving again?”

“You’ve demonstrated, both during my absence and since my return, that AAU doesn’t really need two consultants to run it. I spoke to Hanssen last week and suggested that it would be better for the harmony of the ward if I left. I have three more weeks of my notice left to work out, then I’ll be gone.”

“Running away, again?”

“No. Making a strategic withdrawal to go where my skills will be useful and to where I won’t be treated like a leper.”

“Well, if you hadn’t run away –”

Bernie snorts. “In your _professional_ opinion, Ms Campbell,” she begins, emphasising the word ‘professional’, “do you consider it sound management practice to ostracise a member of your team; to only include them in meetings as an afterthought and with no regard for the fact that you’re making them cut short their sleep cycle to attend said meetings; and to generally behave as if they’re something nasty on the sole of your shoe? I ask from a purely disinterested point of view, you understand – just hoping for a bit of insight to take with me to my next post.”

Serena can’t help gaping, open-mouthed, at Bernie as she quietly tears shreds off her, but before she can respond the intercom crackles again.

“Ms Campbell?”

“Here.” Serena hasn’t, in fact, moved away from the lift control panel where the speaker for the intercom is positioned.

“We think we’ve traced the fault so we’re just going to give the system a test run, and provided that works, we’ll get you out of there.”

“Thank you, Mr Stubbs.”

“Hang tight, ladies.”

Serena hears a pained noise and turns to see Bernie getting up stiffly, and she can’t help thinking that the blonde’s back must be playing merry hell with her now. 

After a few minutes of deafening silence, the lift shudders into motion, and Serena heaves a silent sigh of relief. She desperately wants to get out of this box. She even more desperately wants to talk to Henrik – although she’ll ask him to come down and see her, she thinks, rather than risk taking the lift back up to see him.

She makes straight for the office to hang up her coat and deposit her handbag in the bottom drawer of her desk, then she heads to nurses’ station for Fletch to update her on the patients they have on the ward this morning.

She deliberately keeps her back turned to the office, not allowing herself to watch Bernie making her way inside to gather her coat and satchel before she heads to the locker room to change out of her scrubs and into those impossibly skinny jeans she favours, and whatever shirt and sweater combination she’s wearing today.

Once Fletch has got her caught up, she makes her way back to her office and calls Henrik, who agrees to come down to see her within the hour.

While she waits, she focuses on getting caught up on the NHS’ endless paperwork.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 

“You might have told me Bernie’s leaving,” Serena all but snaps at Hanssen when he shows up forty minutes later.

“It’s hardly my responsibility to do so,” Henrik says, apparently unperturbed by her manner. “You’re co-leads, which implies that you communicate with one another.” He steeples his fingers, pressing his chin lightly to the points. “How did you find out?”

“She told me. When we were trapped in the lift.” She swallows. “We had a row, in the lift.”

“Well, having a row is a form of communication, I suppose. Though hardly the most productive one.”

“No,” Serena agrees in a small voice. “She – she critiqued my management style.”

“Did she now? I must say I did wonder how long she would suffer your behaviour in silence.”

“And why didn’t you tell me she’s suffering from panic attacks?” demands Serena.

“See above re responsibility and communication,” Henrik says. “I was told in confidence.” He eyes her, then adds, “I found Berenice in the midst of having one in the Peace Garden two weeks ago.”

“When?”

“The morning after the night shift where she had to operate on two young children and their mother who were hit by a drink driver when they were on their way to the supermarket.”

Serena swallows. “I remember she stayed late that morning, fretting about the three of them.”

“And you lost both of the children before she left,” Henrik observes.

“I should have known she’d take it to heart.”

“Yes, Serena, you should. For how long are you going to go on punishing her for taking that secondment in Kyiv?”

“She ran away from me!”

“Yes, but she also came back. I doubt she’ll have told you this, but she was offered a permanent place in the new Trauma Unit in Kyiv. She would have had a team of ten dedicated doctors and nurses working under her direction and much greater scope for her considerable talents. Instead, she chose to come back to Holby, where she has a single trauma bay and no dedicated staff.” He gets to his feet. “She came back to you, Serena, and now you’re doing everything you can, it seems to me, to drive her away again. So it’s hardly surprising, really, is it, that Ms Wolfe has decided she’d rather go elsewhere?”

“I had better talk to her later.” She swallows. “Assuming she’ll talk to me.”

“You can only try,” Henrik says. “You may tell her from me that I would be happy should she choose to withdraw her resignation.”

“I will.”

He nods, then departs and Serena leans her elbows on her desk and presses her face to her hands. She sits like that for some time, then she straightens up and calls up the staff rotas. Time to fix at least one thing that she can easily put right. In only a matter of minutes she has the schedules rearranged so that Bernie will be back to working the day shift alongside her. The change doesn’t come into effect until the beginning of next month – which is, in fact, just a week away – but it’s a start.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 

Serena’s plan to talk to Bernie is derailed when the woman in question doesn’t appear on the ward ten minutes before their official handover time as she usually does. Instead, a young Black woman knocks on the half open door to the consultants’ office and introduces herself as Martha.

“Sorry, why are you here?” Serena asks, confused.

“Ms Wolfe asked me to cover for her,” Martha explains. “She’s unwell.”

Serena frowns. “She told me she had a cold.”

Martha raises an eyebrow. “Pneumonia, I reckon,” she says. “I left her a course of antibiotics to take, but I don’t think you should expect to see her for a few days.”

Serena heaves a sigh. “Very well. Thank you, Martha. Let me talk you through the patients we have on the ward this evening.”

Once the handover is complete Serena pulls on her coat, grabs her handbag, and heads out to her car. She feels grateful that Jason is spending a couple of nights at Allan’s, so she doesn’t have to worry about his schedule, because she’s going to go over to Bernie’s and check that she’s okay. She doesn’t distrust Martha, but she does want to be sure before she heads home. 

She pauses at the supermarket on the way to Bernie’s so that she can pick up a few things the trauma surgeon might not have on hand. Then she drives the rest of the way to the block of flats where Bernie lives and carrying the bags of shopping, she makes her way up the three flights of stairs to Bernie’s flat. (Oddly enough, she finds she’d rather not use the lift.)

She pauses on the landing at the top of the third flight of stairs finding herself embarrassingly winded by the climb, then she crosses the hallway to Bernie’s door.

Serena almost doesn’t recognise the trauma surgeon when she opens the door. She’s clad in blue plaid flannel pyjamas and wearing thick woolly socks; she’s wrapped herself in a couple of heavy blankets, her hair is plastered to her head, and she’s even paler than usual apart from two fever spots high on her cheeks.

“What?” Bernie asks aggressively, before turning her face away to cough into a corner of the topmost blanket. “Don’t tell me you’ve come to harass me for daring to fall ill?”

“I deserve that,” Serena says mildly. “I came to see if you were okay and I brought you some supplies.”

Bernie’s eyes widen. “You’ve changed your tune.”

Serena swallows. “I was out of order, this morning.” She huffs. “I’ve been out of order since you got back. I’ve behaved very unreasonably towards you and I wouldn’t blame you if you’d rather throw me out, but at least let me leave you this stuff.”

“I don’t need your charity, Campbell.”

“I know. It’s – it’s not charity. It’s a gesture of friendship and an apology.”

Bernie sighs. “Come in, you’re letting in a draught.” She shuffles away and Serena steps inside, closing the door behind her, then follows Bernie down the hall and into the sitting room.

“It’s not very warm in here, is it?” Serena asks in concern.

“Central heating boiler’s gone,” Bernie tells her. “No heat or hot water for the last couple of days. I’m waiting for the letting agent to arrange for a new one. Should be here in a couple more days.”

Serena is appalled. “Bernie, you can’t stay here. It would be bad enough if you were fit and healthy, but you’re not.”

“Why do you care?” Bernie asks. “We both know that you’ll be only too happy to see the back of me.”

“No, I won’t,” Serena says. “I talked to Hanssen this morning. He told me that the Ukrainians wanted you to say, offered you a job with your own dedicated team and everything. Far more than we’ve offered you. He suggested that the reason you came back to Holby was for me.”

“I came back for us,” Bernie says, not looking at her. “For AAU and our trauma unit, and us. But you’ve made it clear that there is no ‘us’ and that I am very much not wanted here, so I shall go where I can be of use and where I won’t feel like a criminal all the time.”

She stops to cough again, the blanket pressed to her mouth and nose.

“We need to get you out of here,” Serena says. “You can’t stay here without heat and hot water, you’ll end up with pleurisy or something.”

“I’ve already told you that I don’t need your charity,” Bernie says, wheezing.

“Don’t be so bloody stubborn, woman,” Serena says in exasperation. “You’re coming home with me until you’re well again.”

“Make me,” Bernie snarls.

Serena snorts. “That’d be easy, the state you’re in right now – you’re as weak as a kitten.” She sighs. “Berenice Wolfe, if you don’t agree to come home with me I will call Fletch and Ric, and they will bring you by force. Your choice.”

“I don’t know why you care,” Bernie grumbles, shuffling out of the room. 

“Because I love you,” Serena says crossly.

Bernie stops dead, then turns around slowly, eyes wide with shock. “You –”

“Yes. I love you. I didn’t mean to just blurt it out in anger like that, but yes.” She sighs. “I know my words and behaviour don’t match. I know I’ve been behaving like an absolute cow and treating you horribly, and I wouldn’t blame you if you disbelieved me, but it’s true, Berenice Griselda Wolfe. I love you.”

“Oh.”

“Will you please let me start to make things up to you by letting me take you home? There are a couple of guest rooms to choose from. And I’ll feed you beef stew for dinner and soup for lunch tomorrow. And –”

“What about Jason?”

“Jason’s at Allan’s tonight and tomorrow. Besides, he likes you a lot – he’ll probably be delighted to have you staying over.”

“Can’t deny I feel like shit,” Bernie murmurs.

“Then –”

Bernie sighs. “Anything to get you off my back, Campbell.”

“Good.” Serena carries the bags of groceries back down the hall, leaving them by the front door. “Let’s get a bag packed for you, and then I’ll take you there.”

Bernie nods, leading the way into her bedroom. Serena can’t help noticing that it, like her sitting room, is very Spartan, but she keeps that observation to herself. Instead she pulls the khaki coloured kitbag off the top shelf of the wardrobe at Bernie’s request, then fills it up with clothes, pyjamas, and underwear, before adding the toiletries bag from the bathroom, into which Bernie drops two lots of medication. Then she puts in Bernie’s tablet and its charging cord, before checking if there’s anything else she wants.

“I’d better put on some boots and a coat,” the blonde says.

“Okay.” Serena waits until Bernie’s ready, noticing that she’s shed one of her blankets, but that she keeps the other one wrapped around her shoulders before she pulls on her wool coat.

They make their way downstairs, although they take the lift this time, Serena still carrying the two bags of shopping, while Bernie insists on carrying her kitbag.

They load up the boot of the car, then Bernie climbs into the passenger seat and Serena into the driver’s seat. “Anything you want to pick up on the way?” she asks as she pulls out of the parking spot near Bernie’s building.

“New lungs?” Bernie suggests.

Serena chuckles. “That’s a hard ask,” she observes.

“I know. And yes, I do know it’d be better if I stopped smoking.”

“I never said a word on the subject.”

“You didn’t have to. I know you were thinking it. I have tried.”

Serena reaches over to pat Bernie’s knee, waiting at the red light. “We all have our vices. Yours is fags, mine is booze.”

Bernie nods, the leans her head against the window. Moments later, when Serena glances across, the blonde is fast asleep. She sighs, wondering how she could have been so bitter and cruel to Bernie, particularly given that she truly does love her. 

Once they reach Serena’s leafy detached she drops her hand to Bernie’s knee and squeezes. “C’mon, love, let’s get you into the warm.”

Bernie stirs awake, blinking furiously in some bewilderment. “What –” she starts, then stops. “Oh. Sorry, I didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

“It’s fine,” Serena says. She unbuckles both of their seat belts, then climbs out of the car and goes to unlock the front door. 

When she returns Bernie is just easing herself out of the car. 

“Go straight in,” Serena tells her. “Sitting room’s the first door on the right. I’ll bring in the bags.”

“I can –”

“Please, Bernie, just go indoors, into the warm.”

“Aye, Fräulein.” She tips two fingers to her brow in an approximation of a salute.

“Shush, you,” Serena says fondly and gets a shy smile in response.

Bernie heads towards the front door without further argument, to Serena’s intense relief, and she focuses on getting the bags from the boot and into the house as she only wants to make one trip. She slings the strap of Bernie’s kitbag across her chest, then grabs the two shopping bags and carries everything indoors.

She notes Bernie’s coat is hung up on a coat peg next to Serena’s empty one, and her boots are on the shoe rack beneath. She sets down the bags, removes her own coat and shoes, leaving her handbag on the hall table, then she slips on her house shoes before going in search of her guest.

“How about a nice hot soak in the bath and a cup of tea while I make dinner?” she asks.

Bernie’s perched on the edge of the armchair that Jason usually favours and she can’t help smiling at the sight of her in his usual spot.

The trauma surgeon groans. “A bath sounds wonderful. I’ve only got a shower in my place.”

“Come on, then. I’ll show you the guest rooms and the bathroom. My only request is that you don’t rearrange anything in the bathroom as Jason’s very particular about where his things go. One of the reasons that I’m glad Ellie only comes home rarely.”

“Don’t you worry about messing up his things when you’re coming in late from Albie’s?” Bernie asks.

“Cheeky,” Serena says, swatting her lightly on the arm. “No, I don’t. My room has an ensuite.”

“Gosh. Posh.”

She chuckles. “Come on, upstairs with you.” She makes a point to grab Bernie’s kitbag once they’re in the hall, then leads the way upstairs.

“That’s my room, to the left,” Serena tells her. “This one on the right is Jason’s, and the one beyond it is Ellie’s, so you have the choice of one opposite Jason or one opposite Ellie.”

“Jason,” Bernie says, so Serena opens the door to the guest room opposite Jason’s room, and ushers her friend inside. 

“Do you want some bath salts in the bath?” she asks, getting a nod in response. “Okay. I’ll get some towels for you to use and leave them on the heated towel rails.”

“You don’t have to go to so much trouble,” Bernie says as she unwinds the blanket from around her body.

“No, but I want to. I want to care of you and make you feel at least a little bit better. If that’s okay with you?”

“Don’t mind if you do, Campbell.”

“Good.” She goes into the bathroom and starts the bath running, adding some Radox muscle relaxing bath salts to the water. She grabs the spare bathrobe from the back of the door and hands it to Bernie to change into, then fetches some towels from the linen cupboard. When she returns to the bathroom Bernie’s hovering by the door, the bathrobe wrapped around her body and her arms wrapped around herself. 

“Let me just pop these onto the towel rails, then I’ll leave you in peace.”

“I didn’t figure you for someone who was into aromatherapy candles,” Bernie observes.

“They’re Elinor’s actually. She didn’t bother taking them with her the last time she went back to Cambridge. Would you like me to light them for you?”

“No. Thank you.”

Serena nods and moves back out of the bathroom so that Bernie can enter. “Would you like me to bring up a cup of tea, or do you prefer to have it when you come downstairs?”

“I’ll have it when I come down, thanks.”

“Okay. The beef stew should be ready in about half an hour.” Seeing Bernie’s frown, she elaborates, “I do it in the slow cooker, so it’s been on for most of the day.”

Bernie nods. “I’ll be there.”

Serena nods, then backs out of the bathroom and heads to her own bedroom to change into something more casual. She doesn’t go for the pyjama-clad look that Bernie’s adopted, but she does find an old pair of Keller scrub bottoms, so she slips into them, then adds a comfy sweater as well. Next she heads to the kitchen to lay the table for two and to fill the kettle for that cuppa that she desperately wants right now. It’s odd for her not to want a glass of Shiraz, but for once she’d rather have some tea.

Bernie arrives in the kitchen about twenty minutes after Serena left her. “I felt that I was in danger of falling asleep in there,” she explains.

“Okay. Tea?”

“Yes, please.” She sits down at a gesture from Serena, then says, “Thank you for doing this.”

Serena squeezes her shoulder in passing. “It is literally the least I can do for you after the last three weeks.”

She makes a mug of tea for Bernie, adding two sugars and just a splash of milk, then hands the mug over, and tries not gasp when their fingers brush as the blonde takes the mug from her.

She puts the radio on low, then serves up two platefuls of the stew. “Jason likes warm crusty bread with his. Would you like some?”

“Yes, please.” 

Serena takes the loaf from the oven where it has been warming and cuts several thick slices, then sets them on a plate on the table along with some butter. “Help yourself.”

Bernie takes a slice and butters it thickly, then sets to eating. They eat in silence but, for the first time since Bernie’s return from Kyiv, it’s a silence that’s companionable rather than fraught, and Serena feels herself relaxing.

“More?” she asks when Bernie’s finished her first plateful. “There’s plenty there, still.”

“Yes, please,” Bernie says with a bashful smile.

Serena fills her plate again, then sits down to finish her own meal. “When was the last time you ate a decent meal?” she asks. “And I don’t mean take away or pizza?”

Bernie shrugs, then swallows a mouthful. “I haven’t had much appetite lately.”

“Well that explains why you look painfully skinny. I noticed it this morning when we were stuck in the lift.”

“I – um – I haven’t been eating or sleeping properly since – well, since I went to Kyiv.”

Serena sighs softly. “Oh Bernie. Whatever am I going to do with you?”

That elicits another shrug and Serena shakes her head, despairing slightly. She can’t help watching the trauma surgeon from the corner of her eye and when she notices Bernie is starting to droop with tiredness, she clasps her arm briefly, then says, “You should go to bed, love.”

“Yeah,” Bernie agrees without making any effort to move.

Serena tuts, then gets to her feet and coaxes the blonde out of her seat and guides her upstairs to the guest room.

“I hope you sleep better tonight. If you need anything feel free to text me.”

“Thank you.”

“Goodnight, Bernie.”

“G’night S’r’na.”

Serena could swear the other woman’s asleep as soon as her head hits the pillow. She can’t help leaning down to press a fond kiss to Bernie’s brow, then she backs out of the room, turning out the light on the way.

She heads back downstairs to the kitchen and clears away their meal things, loads up the dishwasher, then switches it on. Then she pours herself a half glass of Shiraz and takes it into the sitting room: there are a couple of television shows she wants to catch up on, so she intends to take advantage of Jason’s absence to start watching at least one of them. Her internet researches after she and Bernie had kissed had led her to _Orange is the New Black_ , which is, apparently, the lesbian show to watch. Now is the time to make a start on it, she decides.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 

Bernie stays at Serena’s for three days, spending most of her time sleeping and fighting the pneumonia. In the evenings they sit at opposite ends of the sofa, their feet tangled together and a blanket covering them as far as their waists. It is, Serena decides, sheer domestic bliss, and it’s something she desperately wants to revel in, but she doesn’t know if Bernie feels the same and she’s almost too afraid to ask her.

Then on the third evening, in an interlude between Jason’s various programmes, Bernie murmurs, “This is nice.”

“Yes, it is,” Serena agrees. “Maybe we could do it again, without the pneumonia.”

Bernie chuckles wheezily. “That would be even nicer.”

“I do wish you wouldn’t go back to your flat tomorrow. I know the letting agent let you know the boiler’s been replaced, but I – well, I couldn’t help noticing it’s a bit Spartan.”

“I don’t want to get in the way,” Bernie says.

“You’re not,” Serena replies instantly. “You are definitely not.” She looks around at her nephew as he comes into the sitting room with a plate of his favourite biscuits and a mug of tea. “Jason, do you think Bernie’s in the way while she’s staying here?”

“No,” he says immediately. “I like Doctor Bernie being here.” He looks her in the eye for a moment. “And you haven’t messed up the bathroom at all, even though you’ve been sick.” He settles into his armchair, then adds, “Please stay, Doctor Bernie.”

Serena raises her eyebrows and the blonde sighs. “Well, now that you’ve strong armed me into it,” she says, “I suppose I have no choice.”

Serena grins widely. “Good. I don’t want you to go back to your flat until your doctor tells you that you’re fit to return to work.”

“Aye, Fräulein.” 

Serena squeezes Bernie’s ankle through the blanket, then settles down again, pleased with the success of her appeal to Jason to back her up. 

She’s already notified Hanssen that Bernie’s withdrawn her resignation and he’d been pleased to hear it, and to hear that they’ve made up their differences. He shared Serena’s concern that Bernie had fallen victim to pneumonia but was happy to hear that the trauma surgeon was staying with her and being looked after.

Ideally, she’d like Bernie to move in with her, even if they’re not going to enter into a more intimate relationship – although she hopes that the latter might be a possibility once Bernie’s recovered, particularly given some of the smouldering looks she’s received from the blonde. 

For now, though, she’s happy and she believes Bernie is too – and that is enough for the moment.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted [here](https://pers-books.tumblr.com/post/630517433572147200/hey-so-the-tropes-list-failed-big-time-by-not).


End file.
